The Michigan Daily-Tuesday, April 3, 1979-Page 7 arts & entertainment Four plays tickle Albee fans MAGGIE SMITH In 1 969 The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie Forget the maudlin theme sung by ROD McKUEN if you can and come to see MAGGIE SMITH as the outrageously ill- informed and irrepressibly mad Brodie. She's a teacher at an exclusive Guru's school in the 30's and a little old to get taken down the primrose path. Academy Award for Best Actress. WED: BETTY BOOP CARTOONS THURS: Lucas's THX 1138 Cinema Guild TONIGHT 7:00 & 9:15 OLD ARCH. AUD. $1.50 I I By CHRISTOPHER POTTER It's a fascinating though often sobering experience to be re-introduced to formerly cherished, lately forgotten works of art to see if they have withstood the test of time. Such is the unavoidable test forced upon Edward Albee's The American Dream and The Zoo Story, two in a quartet of one-act plays staged and directed by the playwright Saturday at Power Center. Two decades ago, Albee burst into a stagnating American theater like a lightning bolt. American Dream and Zoo Story exemplified what was proclaimed an avant garde revolution: The former was an overtly ex- pressionistic fantasy which was ger- minal in defining the term "black comedy;" the latter was a more stylistically conventional yet searing interplay of grim humor and horror that did as much as any work of its time to delineate the lonely anguish of the ''beat generation."~ Though his work in the subsequent fifteen years has all too often dwindled into clever, baroque triviality, this decline might ironically be a case of Albee the man resolving the inner tor- ment that}provoked the genius of Albee the playwright. The American Dream (1960) and The Zoo Story (1958) are primary products of the author's white-heat period, and. it's interesting to see whether they carry the same urgency for today's audience. Dream depicts images of sterility, castration, numbness - at- titudes endemic to all of Albee's work. His living room tableau brings us Mommy: Loud, overbearing, stridently trivial; Daddy: Ineffectual, fearful, anal-oriented; and Grandma: Wise, angry, far more flamboyantly full of life than her twisted offspring. Gran- dma grieves for Daddy and despises Mommy, who chronically threatens to have Grandma carted away by "the van men." The play is flecked with absurdist delights: A proper and prim society matron, Mrs. Barker, comes visiting, and exclaims in the most dripping lexicon of social convention: "What an ugly apartment!" Mommy asks if she's like to take off her dress; Mrs. Barker voices gracious thanks, then does so ("I feel ever so much more comfortable.") With the savage precision of a Magritte anomaly Albee mourns the corruption of the language into mindless decorum. Into this polyester environment walks The Young Man, on the surface a ,wandering stud cliche. Self-absorbed in his looks and demeanor, he forges an unlikely alliance with Grandma; two generations removed, they stare at each other across an emotional chasm, yet somehow make contact. The Young Man is the perfect handsome walking ideal of nothing - the devolved product of three generations mutated into min- dlessness: "The American Dream." Dream's performances were generally adroit, though Anne Bar- clay's Grandma suffered from a poor makeup job and a tendency to swallow some of her best lines. Patricia Kilgarriff was bitchily ferocious as Mommy, and Wyman Pendleton suf- ficiently simpering and cringing as Daddy (Pendleton's age posed a problem, though: Did his ineffectual fumblings imply asexuality or simply approaching senility?) Eileen Burns' elegant Mrs. Barker was glitteringly, phonily perfect. As The Young Man, Stephen Rowe delivered his lines in an offhand, vibrant manner sharply contrasting the traditional mannequin projection of the part. The interpretation lent a certain air of hope to Albee's bleak, domesticity, in style if not in content. The American Dream may need not be a dead-end clone - perhaps we can evolve forward again. Albee's direction of The Zoo Story also exuded a subtle shift in emphasis which may indicate a mellowing in the .dmm. lqw playwright's personality. Zoo Story's structure is simple but riveting: A well- dressed man sits reading on a bench in Central Park on a Sunday afternoon. He is approached by a disheveled, slightly dangerous-looking young man, who strikes up a conversation with him. Over the course of the next hour, the young man - named Jerry - reveals himself as a veritable walking catalogue of alienation, a resident of urban Hell unable to make contact with the simplest objects around him. He contorts his entire visage at the sheer agony of existence - "with howling because you're alive." As Jerry rips off the coverings of his soul - often amusingly, as is Albee's trademark - he also drags his not-too- willing listener, Peter, into a similar look at his own psyche: Though finan- cially well-to-do, Peter is revealed as a fearful, prissy, brow-beaten man: A subtler version of American Dream's Daddy. Jerry excoriates Peter with a verbal sadism Albee later refined to a razor's edge in Virginia Woolf; he toys with him, searing him with a disdain ex- ceeded only by Jerry's loathing for himself. Through this contrast of extremes, Jerry feels he has somehow achieved a kind of communication, a link, even if only with a dog. Albee's unsettling message that a synthesizing of great kindnesssandscruelty are "the teaching emotions" serves as the ominous prelude to the play's violent, apocalyp- tic climax. Once Zoo Story debuted, the charac- ter of Jerry became a symbol of modern estrangement to dozens of literary descendants - from Teddy in When You Comin' Back, Red Ryder? to Taxi Driver's Travis Bickle. Yet one is a bit perplexed as to just how Albee perceives his protagonist today. Though Zoo Story nimbly, almost simultaneously juxtaposes comedy and tragedy (no one equals Albee at th i art), one detected a subtle shift in em- phasis in the Power Center production. Albee seemed to pace his two charac- ters in a more snappy, contrapuntal style, eschewing some of the play's darker mode in favor of rapid-fire repartee. Many of Jerry's confessional monologues took on an almost musical, rhythmic quality, as if the author/director had become preoc- cupied more with tone than with con- tent. In the process, The Zoo Story's black comedy elements seemed to override its tragic overtones to the point where the audience was still emit- ting mirthful responses - not necessarily misplaced - right through the play's shocking, horrific final moments. Stephen Rowe's Jerry was wondrous to behold. An absorbingly physical ac- tor, Rowe paced the stage like a grimy, caged panther, giving vent to all the pained fury built up in, a lifetime of loneliness. Wyman Pendleton was somewhat less successful as Peter, with the actor's advanced age once again distorting the scenario. Though the two characters are supposed to be of comparable chronology, the obvious age gap between the two performers make Jerry's purposeful bullying smack slightly of a senior citizen mugging. T-h'is is a significant departure in form, and one with which I'm not very comfortable. Though it seems logical and right to accept the author's own in- terpretation as the definitive viewpoint, I harbor vague suspicions that Albee feared Jerry's pure rage wouldn't stand up in 1979, that a more sardonic, less fiery interpretation was necessary to reach today's audiences. If so, it represents a philosophical retreat which cheapens his play's power, which I feel remains as vibrant today as it did 20 years ago. By ANNE SHARP Many years ago, Mad magazine did a feature on The Shortest Books Ever Written. One of the titles was "The Warm, Wonderful World of Edward Albee". Albee the playwright is no sen- timentalist. Gut-level tragedy, with all its pity and horror, is his meat and drink, and he has abandoned the more facile trappings of traditional theater in order to convey them in s'tark reality. Albee is best known for angst-ridden works like Zoo Story and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Perhaps it was in the script, or in the way Albee directed his work, but Counting the Ways, the Albee one-act which opened Saturday evening's show at Power Center, was a most un-albeesque little entertainment. Counting the Ways is a charming, funny series of very brief vignettes. A fiftyish woman, (Patricia Kilgarriff, with a frizzy, short perm), asks her husband (Wyman Pendleton) as if in an aside, "Do you love me?" Of course he does; he is a jovial, aesthetic fellow, quite pleased with the way things are, but af- ter a few blackouts it appears that the woman is dissatisfied ,with 1their sex life; she tells us about it, in typical Albee fashion, both cryptically and in gross detail. ALBEE IS NO pretty poet, and he reminds us that love in this world equals sex. Meanwhile, He (Albee's character), perplexed and hurt, asks her why there are now two little beds in their room, instead of one big one. A loud, Pavlovian bell sounds from the control room at this point. "Identify yourselves," orders the booming, un- seen, Godlike voice of the stage manager over the intercom. Smiling, all out of character, Patricia Kilgarriff springs to her feet and, slightly flushed, explains to the audience that this is where Albee directed them to interrupt the play and speak extemporaneously about themselves. The two return to their places after a brief personal exposition, resume character, and Pendleton cries, as if nothing has happened, "Separate rooms! Oh, God!" WHAT MAKES Albee's plays -so enigmatic at first (or second or third) glance is that he introduces the unin- formed observer to a set of complex people who, it seems, existed long before the author wrote down their struggles, and who never stop living for a moment in order to explain to the audience what the hell is going on in their lives. The husband/wife relationship in Counting the Ways is obvious from the outset, which is probably why the audience found the play so amusing and accessible. However, Listening calls on us to play plot detective again. Three characters meet in a decaying, lush garden: a man (Wyman Pendleton), a woman, (Eileen Burns, a great lioness-haired Margaret Tyzack of an actress), and what we gather is supposed to be a young girl, but is really Patricia Kilgarriff in one of those grinning, grotesque performan- ces given by mature tragediennes who are forced to play roles which are far too young for them. What follows is your typical, inscrutable, subterranean Albee situation, as difficult to explain as to explicate, with tangled relation- ships aboundiig. Though the entertainment value was negligible, Listening did boast a magnificent performancedby Eileen Burns. As the cruel, flippant, brooding woman of the garden, she clearly dominated the stage, a character we loved to hate. It's so seldom that exciting, original stage performances like Albee Directs Albee come to this sedate, uninspired University town. Maybe some angry young man or woman found some in- spiration insAlbee's visit here, and will decide to start his own revolt against theatrical convention. A bright thought for the future of the U-M drama depar- tment, but not a very likely possibility. The University of Michigan Gilbert and Sullivan Society Presents Or 'The Lass That Loved A Sailor' April 5-8 and 12-14,1979 Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre, Ann Arbor Tickets availb"e at the Mendelssohn Box Office 10 a.m.-B p.m. Coll 763-1085. SPECIAL STUDENT RATE Students with U of M I.D. may purchase tickets at a discount for performances on April 5, 8, and 12. These tickets will be on sale only from 2-4 p.m. at the Mendelssohn Box Office'the Wednes. day preceding the performance. Price: $2.50 LIMIT: 1 ticket/U of M I.D. . i ~ 1' ' , i . ', QU1IdUfrK WANT TO BE A CAMP COUNSELOR? SPEND YOUR SUMMER IN CAMP EQUINUNK OR CAMP BLUE RIDGE, A BROTHER-SISTER CAMP IN THE POCONO'S Openings in all field sports, general, waterfront (with WSI), water-ski, tennis, gymnastics, pioneering, nature, science, music, archery, and hockey. , Stop in or call Ann Cooper at CAREER PLACEMENT AND PLANNING (Summer Placement), 763-4117, STUDENT ACTIVITIES BUILDING, ROOM 3200, and sign up for an ON CAMPUS INTERVIEW on FRIDAY, APRIL 6, from 9:00 to 5:00. I STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS FOR LOTRD at SPECIAL PRICES come to ERIC'S SECOND SERVE Z Factory Outlet for Discount Sports Apparel. a Name Brands, Overruns and Secondsr y Long-Sleeve Leotards $6.80/Short-Sleeve $6.30 Tights $3.70/ Any Top and Bottom $9.25 406 E. Liberty 2 Blks. off State St. 663-6771 3 STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS STUDENTS CEDAR POINT AMUSEMENT PARK, Sandusky, Ohio, will hold on-campus interviews for summer employment: Date: Wednesday, April 4 Time: 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. Place: Summer Placement* Over 3,200 positions available for a wide variety of jobs. y Dormitory or apartment style housing available. Contact Summer Placement Office for informa- tion and appointment. Spend a sum- mer in one of the finest resort areas* J n the North. D L CEDAIPOINT * * * ** * * * f 4 os Join the Arts Page The Ann Arbor Film Cooperetive presents at ALB 3 TUESDAY, APRIL 3 MY LIFE TO LIVE (Vivre So Vie, Jean-Luc Godard, 1962) 7 only-MLB 3 More has been written about MY LIFE TO LIVE than perhaps any other Godard film. A young French girl becomes a prostitute to make a living, and becomes caught in a relationship with her pimp. Concerned with the relationship of words to feeling, images to reality, the film prompted Susan Santag to de- scribe it as "one of the most extraordinary, beautiful and original works of art I know." With Anna Karina. In French, with subtitles. Music by Michel Lengrand. WEEKEND (Jean-Luc Godard, 1976) 8:30 only-MLB 3 Perhqps the greatest film of its kind, this is Godard's last and most incisive look into the 60's. "The film must be seen for its power, ambition, humor, and scenes of astonishing beauty."-N.Y. TIMES. THE WAR IS OVER (Alain Resnais, 1966)., 10:30 only-MLB 3 MIAGILIN SPECIAL GUEST LARY CORYELL ;, WEDNESDAY- MAY 2-8pm HILL AUD." ANN ARBOR TICKETS $6.50, 550, 450